The Awards Committee of the "Society for the Study of Early Modern Women" has selected Anne Larsen's critical edition of "Les Secondes Oeuvres" (Second Works) by Madeleine and Catherine des Roches for a 1998 Edition Honorable Mention.

The award was announced on Friday, Oct. 29, during the Society's General Meeting at the Sixteenth Century Studies Conference in St Louis, Mo. Larsen's book was one of three works to receive recognition from the Society in the "Editions" category this year. Larsen's 410-page edition appeared with Droz, a publisher in Geneva, Switzerland, that specializes in critical editions and studies of literary texts from antiquity to the present. Larsen also recently published with Droz her critical edition of "Les Missives" (Letters), the third and final volume of the works of the Des Roches. The 450-page edition contains the first adaptation in French of Claudian's epic poem "De raptu Proserpinae" (The Rape of Proserpina), and 100 personal letters, the first such letters published by women in France. Larsen's edition of their first volume "Les Oeuvres" (Works) appeared in 1993. Larsen's three-volume effort is the first edition of the works since their original publication in the 16th century. Madeleine and Catherine des Roches, a mother- daughter team who were members of the gentry of Poitiers in south-western France, published their works between 1578 and 1586. They held a salon which hosted numerous writers, poets and professionals. Catherine refused to marry so that she could go on writing and publishing with her mother. Larsen noted that the two women, who she said were remarkably well-educated for their time, were among the first to argue in print for the equality of men and women and to protest the way that women of their day were treated. They both died in 1587 of the plague. Larsen earned her bachelor's degree from Hope College, and her master's and doctorate from Columbia University. She came to Hope as an associate professor of French in 1984 and became full professor in 1993. She is currently working with Michael Brinks, a Hope senior from Portage, on a collaborative translation of the works of Madeleine and Catherine des Roches.